Sunday, June 30, 2013

Richard Rorty was an American philosopher who is not well known outside
of academic circles. I certainly have not read him extensively and do not know
a lot about him. But I have recently read, and have been impressed with, his
1998 essay titled “Failed Prophecies, Glorious Hopes.”

Rorty, who died six years ago this month (in 6/07) at the
age of 75, was the grandson of the noted German-American theologian Walter
Rauschenbusch, the son of the latter’s oldest child. But unlike his grandfather
and mother, Rorty was a secular humanist rather than a Christian believer.

Still, Rorty had great appreciation for his grandfather.
That is evident from the afterword he wrote for “Christianity and the Social
Crisis in the 21st Century,” the centennial re-issue of
Rauschenbusch’s classic work “Christianity and the Social Crisis” (1907).

From his secular humanist viewpoint, Rorty compares the New
Testament and the Communist Manifesto in the 1998 essay. He avers that

both documents
are expressions of the same hope: that some day we shall be willing and able to
treat the needs of all human beings with the respect and consideration with
which we treat the needs of those closest to us, those whom we love.

That glorious “hope
for social justice,” says Rorty, is “the
only basis for a worthwhile human life.” And, according to Rorty, the idea
of social justice includes the hope that “the
world might be changed so as to ensure that no one goes hungry while others
have a surfeit.”

Rorty realized that if social justice is to be achieved there
will have to be some redistribution of wealth. Echoing the emphasis of his
grandfather on the “social gospel,” non-Christian Rorty declares, “There is no way to take the New Testament
seriously as a moral imperative . . . without taking the need for such
redistribution equally seriously.”

Then, alluding to the Communist Manifesto, Rorty writes,

To say that history is the history of class struggle is still true, if
it is interpreted to mean that in every culture, under every form of
government, and in every imaginable situation . . . the people who have already
got their hands on money and power will lie, cheat and steal in order to make
sure that they and their descendants monopolize both for ever.

But, alas, both the New Testament and the Manifesto of Marx
and Engels have to this point been “failed prophecies.” We in the United States
have no trouble seeing the miserable failure of Marxism in most of the countries
where it became dominant.

Cambodia is a good example. The Khmer Rouge was the Communist
Party of Cambodia under the despotic rule of Pol Pot. It may have embraced a
glorious hope for social justice in the beginning, but it is hard to imagine a
more dismal failure. More than 2,000,000 Cambodians were killed by the Khmer
Rouge in the 1970s.

Certainly the New Testament has not failed so miserably,
especially in recent decades. And yet, from the time of Charlemagne through the
era of European colonialism to rather recently, political and military rulers who have claimed to be Christians have led to the slaughter, enslavement, and
oppression of people around the world.

I am not as pessimistic as Rorty was. Many Christians are still
seeking social justice based on the teachings of Jesus Christ and the New
Testament. But, sadly, there are many others who are not. Rorty’s pessimism was
not completely unfounded.

Things would have been much different, though, if the ideas
of Rorty’s grandfather had been implemented more widely, rather than being
largely rejected by the fundamentalists of the 1920s and afterward.

Tuesday, June 25, 2013

Every child and grandchild is
special in his or her own way. June and I have four children and seven
grandchildren, and we think that each one is special.

This article is about our
special grandchild Naomi Kei Seat. Naomi is special partly because she was
born in 2004, the very year we returned to the States after 38 years in Japan.
And her mother is Japanese.

Our youngest son
Ken and Mina Takazaki were married in 1999. After living in Japan for a couple
of years they moved to the U.S. and settled in Maryland. Naomi is their first
child.

Natalie, another
special grandchild, was born six years later, in 2010. But Naomi was our first
grandchild who is half Japanese.

Being “half,”
though, is not always a positive thing—especially in Japan. In fact, sometimes
children of international marriages are called Halfs there. And especially in the past, Halfs have often been
discriminated against in various ways.

Partly for that
reason, soon after Naomi was born I wrote her a letter, trying first to express
something of my great joy on hearing about her birth. In that letter I also
mentioned how she might sometimes be referred to as a Half, but I challenged
her (and her parents) to think of herself not as a Half but as a Double.

And much has been
done in that regard. Naomi’s parents each speak to her primarily in their
native tongue, so she and her little sister are completely bilingual to this
point. And speaking two languages equally well is perhaps the main thing
necessary for being a Double.

Third Culture Kid (TCK) is a term that also might be
used for children like Naomi, although, technically, the term has mainly been
used to refer to children who accompany their parents to live in another
country and/or culture.

(The term third culture kid was coined in the
1950s by American sociologist and anthropologist Ruth Hill Useem; we had the
privilege of entertaining Dr. Useem as a houseguest back in the 1970s when she
was doing research in Japan.)

Naomi’s father was
a true TCK, and that is what led to the international marriage and Naomi’s
being born as a Double, one who has grown up knowing two languages and
understanding two countries/cultures.

Some of you have a
grandchild like Naomi, one who is from an international or bicultural marriage.
And most of you know one or more children like that.

I encourage you to
see such children, and to encourage them to see themselves, as Doubles or as
TCKs, and thus as people who can, more than most, be bridges for mutual
understanding between nations and/or cultures.

I am writing about
Naomi at this time partly because last week she flew out to Kansas City from
Washington, D.C., and June and I appreciated her bravery in making such a trip
all by herself. We greatly enjoyed her five-day visit with us.

Naomi is a special grandchild. So are all the
others, each in their own way. You grandparents know what I am talking about.
Grandchildren are truly a blessing from above!

Thursday, June 20, 2013

Loung Ung considers herself a lucky child. That is
mainly because she escaped being killed by the Khmer Rouge in her native
Cambodia and then was able to emigrate to the United States when she was ten
years old.

Loung was born in
1970 to a Cambodian father and a Chinese mother in Phnom Penh. She didn’t seem
like a lucky child, though, in 1975 when the Khmer Rouge forced all the middle
class people, like her family, out of the capital city and into rural labor
camps. Over the next four years, her parents and one sister were killed by
ruthless Khmer Rouge soldiers, and another sister died of food poisoning.

“First They Killed
My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers” (2000) is Loung’s first book. It
is a personal account of her experiences during the Khmer Rouge years from 1975
to 1979. The book became a national bestseller, and in 2001 it was given the “Excellence
in Adult Non-fiction Literature” award by the Asian/Pacific American Librarians
Association.

Ung’s second book
is “Lucky Child: A Daughter of Cambodia Reunites with the Sister She Left
Behind” (2005). It is one of two books I read in preparation for my visit to
Cambodia earlier this month, and it is quite impressive.

“Lucky Child” tells
about Loung’s going with her oldest brother and his wife to a refugee camp in
Thailand and then on to the U.S. With the sponsorship of Holy Family [Catholic]
Church in Essex Junction, Vermont, they were able to settle in that small town
and start a new life.

For about 2/3 of the
book, the odd-numbered chapters tell of Loung’s life in the U. S. from 1980
until 1993, and the even-numbered chapters tell what was happening to Chou, her
sister who is two years older, back in Cambodia. Then in the 27th
chapter she tells of her first visit back to Cambodia in 1995 and joyfully reuniting
with Chou and other family members after fifteen years.

“Cambodia’s Curse” (2011) is the other book I have
been reading over the past month. The author is Joel Brinkley, a journalist who
wrote for the New York Times for more than 20 years. His book vividly describes
the atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge under Pol Pot between 1975 and
1979, and afterward.

I had not known (or
remembered) that Cambodia was under direct control of the United Nations in
1991-92. According to Brinkley, this first and only example of the U.N. taking
charge of a country was a dismal failure. But according to Loung’s memoir, the
situation was considerably better after 1992, so it seems that the work of UNTAC
(the United Nations Transitional Authority of Cambodia) was effective.

After graduating
from Saint Michael’s Collegein
1993, Loung worked for years to help rid Cambodia (and other countries) of
landmines, which has been a terrible problem in that sad country. The village
chief who donated the land where New Hope Church was built (as I wrote about
here) stepped on a landmine years ago and now has an artificial leg.

Ung was, indeed, a
lucky child in many ways—and one of those ways was being born into a middle
class family. Most Cambodians did not have the opportunity to leave the country
as she did. She was also “lucky” in having the talent to write so well.

And I consider
myself “lucky” to have found Loung Ung’s captivating book “Lucky Child” and to have
learned so much about Cambodia from it. I think you, too, would be inspired by reading
this outstanding story of surviving and thriving.

Saturday, June 15, 2013

The 72nd
annual Father of the Year awards were presented this past Tuesday (June 11) at
the Grand Hyatt Hotel in New York City by the National Father’s Day Committee, an
entity of the Father’s Day/Mother’s Day Council. Former President Bill Clinton
was one of the recipients.

I first read about
Clinton’s selection as “father of the year” back in January, and I was
somewhat surprised to hear of his selection. Perhaps some of you, though, tend
to agree with the two senior fellows of the Family Research Council, an
organization founded by James Dobson in 1981, who wrote
that Clinton was “unbelievably” chosen and that it was a “misdirected award.”

Actually, Clinton
is just one of this year’s recipients, and some of you Republicans may be glad
to know that Dan Quayle was one of the recipients in 1989 and Ronald Reagan was
an awardee in 1957.

More than
politicians, though, through the years there seems to have been a
disproportionate number of sports celebrities chosen—such as Shaq O’Neal, the
basketball superstar, last year.

Certainly Clinton’s
personal indiscretions before, during, and after (?) his years in the White
House are certainly not what one would expect from someone named “father of the
year.” There is no way of knowing how those indiscretions negatively impacted
the life of Chelsea, now 33, Bill and Hillary’s only child.

But Chelsea made a
surprise appearance at Tuesday’s event and presented the award to her father. “Every
day he’s my dad, and I don’t need an award to tell me he’s the best that I
could have hoped for,” she said. “But I’m grateful he’s getting the recognition
that I, of course, his unapologetically biased daughter, think he’s always
deserved.”

And Clinton said he
received a text message from Hillary saying, “Congratulations. I think you
deserve this.”

Back in January when
the Council announced Clinton’s selection, they highlighted Clinton's
philanthropy through the Clinton Foundation and the Clinton Global Initiative—as
well as his work as the U.N. Special Envoy for Haiti. Exemplary fathers, they
seem to imply, do more than care for just their own children.

What Clinton has
done since he left the White House is considerably more praiseworthy than what
we have seen from the most recent ex-president, who has been more of an exemplary
father along traditional lines of thought. (Does he really spend time painting
his feet in the bathtub?!)

According to the website of the
Father’s Day/Mother’s Day Council, “The objective of this 72 year-old program [to
present the Father of the Year awards] is to enhance the meaning of Father’s
Day—Sunday, June 16, 2013—and encourage universal observance.”

Some of us have
only memories of our fathers, as they have passed on. (My father, whom I
remember with great respect and appreciation, died nearly six years ago.) Most
of you will be able to honor your father directly tomorrow, in person or by
telephone.

And those of us who
are fathers can use this time to reflect on how we can be better fathers—for our
own children and for the children of the world. Perhaps “father of the year”
Bill Clinton is an example for us to emulate because of not just what he has
done for Chelsea but primarily what he has done for so many children (and
adults) through the Clinton
Foundation and the activities of the Clinton Global Initiative.

Monday, June 10, 2013

You all have probably heard the term “killing fields” used
to describe the horrendous atrocities committed in Cambodia in the 1970s. And
maybe most of you have seen theheart-rending
movie released in 1984 with that title.

“Killing
Fields” won three Academy Awards, including Best Supporting Actor by Haing S. Ngor,
who was himself a survivor of the Khmer Rouge regime and the labor camps. Prior
to the Khmer Rouge’s “Year Zero,” he was a medical doctor based in Phnom Penh.

But
in 1975, Ngor was one of millions who were relocated from the city to forced
labor camps in the countryside. He spent four years there before fleeing to
Thailand.

Pol
Pot (1925-98) was the diabolical leader of the Khmer Rouge, which slaughtered
nearly a fourth of the Cambodian people between 1975 and 1979. He died and is
buried in the Anlong Veng District of northern Cambodia. One of the many
“killing fields” was in that area.

But
now there is a new church building in a small village in Anlong Veng, and it
was my privilege to speak at the dedication service for that beautiful new
building last Friday.

The
name of the new structure is New Hope Church. Through a strange string of
connections, it was given that name because of New Hope Church in Worth County,
Mo., which was my father’s home church.

A
Japanese friend suggested that name, remembering it from when we took her to north
Missouri in the fall of 2005. She also financed the project, and her husband drew
the plans and supervised the construction of the new church building in Anlong
Veng.

The
dedication service was an elaborate affair, attended by well over three hundred
people, with far more than half of them children. At the beginning and near the
end of the service, some of the local children performed traditional Cambodian
dances.

My
message was based on Romans 5:1-5, and I titled it “New Hope for Anlong Veng.” Nhao
Troeun, a fine young Cambodian man who works with the Food for the Hungry
organization, translated the sermon into Cambodian.

New
Hope Church in Anlong Veng will be used for the ministry of Missionary Hwang
Ban Suk from Korea. Through a Korean business partner, my Japanese friend became
acquainted with Missionary Hwang’s sister and her husband, who is a pastor in
Seoul (and where I had the joy of preaching on June 2). Through that connection
she learned about the work of Missionary Hwang and ended up building the new church
for his ministry.

Last
Friday after “dinner on the grounds,” attended by most of the adults who were
at the dedication service (the children had to go back to school), I went with my
Japanese friends (seven in all) to visit the nearby area where Pol Pot died and
is buried. It was about a 20-minute drive from New Hope Church and less than a
mile from the Thai border.

During
the years Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge controlled Cambodia, most of the people who
were not killed lived in fear, great physical need, and a general state of hopelessness.

Although
the political situation has improved considerably in the last 20 years, there
is still widespread poverty throughout most of the rural areas. With the new
church building now ready for use in his ministry Missionary Hwang will be even
more effective in fostering new hope in the hearts of the people of Anlong
Veng, one of the former killing fields in Cambodia.